There are three categories of Awards presented at the Society’s AGM, which will be held on Saturday on the 24th of June 2017 and hosted by the Merredin Branch in Merredin, WA. The closing date for nominations is Tuesday on the 2nd of May 2017. Please mark your nominations CONFIDENTIAL and forward them to the Honorary General Secretary, Wildflower Society of WA (Inc.), PO Box 519, Floreat, WA 6014. Members should consider resubmitting a previous nomination if it was unsuccessful.
Wildflower Society Award
The criterion for this award is that the person or group should have advanced the aims of the Society. The recipient does not necessarily have to be a member of the Society but most are. Nominations should be no more than two pages long. A nomination may be made by an individual or by a Branch Committee. A subcommittee of the Management Committee is established specifically for this award after the deadline for nominations. None of this subcommittee’s members can be nominators or potential recipients.
Honorary Life Membership
This award is not restricted to one member per year nor is it necessarily made annually. A member nominated for this award should have rendered special or meritorious service to the Society and must be nominated by a member of the Society. The nomination is approved by the Management Committee. Honorary Life Members do not pay the annual fee but are entitled to the benefits and privileges of an Individual Member. Nominations should not be more than one page in length.
Meritorious Award
Nominations for this award are made by Branches and are for services to the Society at a Branch level. The nomination is approved by the Management Committee. There is no restriction on the number of Meritorious Awards given each year, and Branches may nominate more than one member.
Kerry Smith, Honorary General Secretary
Photo: Diana Corbyn, one of the Award Recipients in 2016
Plants are everywhere, always in the background, never really having much focus drawn on them. But often creating the sense of place and atmosphere of the area they are in. An example of this is when we in Australia see eucalyptus, we instantly think of our Australian outback. Or when we see boreal forests and Cacti. We are reminded of where they are.
This is true when we think of plants in works of fiction and at that especially in science fiction where these places are limited only by the individuals imagination. Usually when we think about plant life on another world we tend to resort to analogues within our own. Many early science fiction works, when written imagined lush tropical forests filled with plants that had giant man-eating flora.
A common theme for plants in science fiction is just that, an antagonistic force either actively hostile to human life as in the Day of the Triffids, (1951) or as parasitic vegetation. Other themes of plant life in sci-fi include human form flora, an example of this is the plant Groot from Marvels Guardians of the Galaxy series of comics. Opposite to the first theme, some fictional plant species are intelligent and benevolent towards the human race. We encounter this in Clifford D simaks, All Flesh is Grass (1965) when a planet wide intelligent plant proclaims the brotherhood of all species (albeit ruthlessly enforced). Intelligent plant life is no stranger to science fiction with Kevin J Andersons Saga of Seven Suns Verdani trees.
In other works of fiction plants are not active things but instead serve to create a unique background from which the main story takes place in. Of course some of these are dangerous carnivorous plants. But others are similar to the Tesla tree’s from Dan Simmons Hyperion cantos series (1989) which store electricity and release it to scorch nearby competitors. Another is the Red weed from H.G Wells War of the Worlds (1897) which invades earth along with the alien tripods. Or James Camerons Avatar (2009) where upon the alien planet, almost every flora has bioluminescent foliage.
Plant life on earth is often what we use to try and imagine what plant life in these science fiction and fantasy stories might look and behave like. Of course with a little bit of imagination thrown into the mix. This imagination is not limited to recent times, the concept of fictional flora is rooted in antiquity being a subject of imaginative fascination for many people at the start of fictional writing and even today.
In conclusion Plant life in science fiction and Fantasy writing can be just as important as the aliens and the spaceships that are far more popularised.
Dr Eddy Wajon introduces native flora to local MP.
While walking through the Roe 8 reserve, recently, with a Member of Parliament (MP), we all agreed that knowing about the Australian Bush is a key element in building Australia’s national identity.
‘The Bush’ is not an easy thing to get to know, though, and many Australians are not only unwilling to learn more about it but are truly afraid of it. We sense the bush as if “it might have reached a long black arm and gripped us”– to put it in the words of DH Lawrence.
Nuytsia floribunda
When the first European settlement of Western Australia began in 1827, for the most part, the settlers showed little interest in the bush that surrounded them. Instead, homesick Europeans started immediately to clear away the local vegetation. They tried to reinstate the things the way there were back on old continent. As a result new colonies in Western Australia nearly starved through failing to understand the local soils and landscapes and trying to farm using British methods. English-style gardens and European culture still dominated the hearts and minds of early settlers. The striking Nuytsia floribunda (WA Christmas Tree) was named as late as 200 years after Pieter Nuyts sailed around the south coast of WA en route to Batavia in the Dutch East Indies (1627).
Presently, although there are only few little islands of remnant bushland left in WA, the land clearing goes on. One of the greatest Nuytsias found on Swan Coastal Plain is being felled for an extension of another Highway – it does feel like our present government still has a 19th-century mindset.
Image of Great Nuytsia that has been already cleared for Roe 8.
I do hope that the Aussie nation will open its eyes to that rich source of stories, knowledge and identity found in the local bush before we turn into a mindless mass of consumers.
These lovely photos are from Wildflower Society member Gerald Lorenz who joined the Society four years ago when he was visiting Perth. With his renewal he sent us a beautiful calendar with his photos – all taken in Germany! He says ‘I have lost my heart to your animals, flowers and nature that lives in Australia – especially in WA. Since then I’m growing some of your plants here. Now my collection counts about 50 different species of trees, bushes and flowers.’ Thank you Lorenz for your beautiful photos – you are an inspiration to us!
There’s something special about watching the sun rise from Kings Park… when the surface of the river is like glass, the sky has a rosy tinge, and there’s a bit of chill in the air. The city emerges from the gloom and the trees along Fraser Avenue turn gold. Some parrots erupt from the canopy in a sudden assault of sound, and then the mournful call of a raven and some warbling magpies. And the flowers… the flowers in spring! All that colour and variety and beauty that words just can’t convey…
Kings Park has to be my favourite green space in Perth. But you probably have your own favourite – it might be a park, or some remnant bushland, even a backyard. These spaces will also be special to you for very individual reasons. It is something I’ve been exploring for my PhD as well as how important intangible things (like beauty or solitude or relaxation) are to people’s experiences of urban green space. I’m interested because I want to know if green spaces in a city like Perth are enough for users to feel connected with nature.
The American ecologist, Robert M. Pyle came up with the rather gloomy term, ‘extinction of experience’ which he used to describe an ever-diminishing connection between humans and common species of plants and animals in an everyday environment, especially in the developed world. He warned that “those who know and recognise less, care less, and therefore act less, leading to still more losses”.[1] So if people in cities can connect with nature in urban green spaces that would probably be a good thing!
Flora plays a major role in Vanessa’s work as an artist and textile designer. Since moving to Western Australia, she has been fascinated by the plant life and wildflowers of WA. Vanessa will discuss some of these influences and the influences of botanical artists on her work, as well as the process and media she uses.
Vanessa spoke recently with Viki Cramer about her art.
New Season. Pyrography on wood.
It all begins with burning the wood. Vanessa Liebenberg loves this phase of developing a new work. “I love wood, the feel of it, the ‘organic-ness’ of it, and when I’m burning into it it’s just got a beautiful look. I find the whole process really meditative. I can do that for hours.”
She works on specially made panels of wood veneer onto which she first makes a detailed drawing, burning out the wood with a pyrography pen.
Her works are then built up, layer upon layer, much like the native bushland that is home to the wildflowers and birds that tangle and flit through her paintings in a cycle of birth, death, rebirth and new beginnings.
“I’m originally a textile designer so I think that’s a big influence because textiles can be quite layered and, especially because I was a woven textile designer, I also did the construction of the fabric as well as the design.”
What lies beneath. Mixed media on wood canvas.
After burning the wood, Vanessa does separate detailed sketches with a calligraphy pen that are transferred onto silk screen and then screen-printed onto the panel. Then she begins to “pull it all together”, beginning with a layer of a medium that allows her to paint onto the wood.
“It’s a really complicated way of doing it,” she admits with a smile, “as now I have all this detail and then I have to sort of paint in between it with the medium, and then I have to paint it again with what I’m doing next, which is mostly acrylic [paint]. Then when everything is really dry I would do the last layer, which is the oil paint.”
Her technique of layering different media is an important part of how Vanessa creates her artworks. Developing this technique has been a gradual process. “I used to do mostly oil painting, mostly quite traditional detailed flowers and portraits, but then I think I got a little bit bored with that. I missed the textile design part and I wanted to add more layers. I missed drawing. I like all those different ways of creating – drawing, painting, printing – and I was thinking of a way of how to combine it into one piece. So gradually it evolved into that process.”
She likes the unexpectedness of where the process takes her. “I will have an idea in my head, but I won’t have a complete picture,” she says of the initial phase of creating a new work.
Somewhere. Pyrography and mixed media on wood.
Vanessa draws inspiration and comfort from the resilience of nature; in how plants and animals endure and adapt to the changing environment around them with what she regards as quiet and joyful determination.
“You look at nature and it just goes on, it doesn’t matter what happens,” she says. Flowers grow in obscure places under the most difficult conditions. “It makes me think that I sometimes take life a bit too seriously, and then when I see that I feel comforted. I think it’s beautiful and soothing and calming, and filled with hope and possibilities.”
Hope and future possibilities, for humanity and for nature, are recurring themes in Vanessa’s work. Several of her paintings feature children surrounded by a kaleidoscope of flowers and birds. “I often think about children and how they’ve got this world of possibilities in front of them, of what can still happen and what they can achieve,” she says. She muses on that feeling of looking back on your own life, especially as you get older, and remembering just how exciting the world was when you were young, when you believed anything could happen.
Possibilities. Pyrography and mixed media on wood.
Vanessa has painted and drawn since she was a child, and continued to do so even while working full-time as a textile designer. At times her obsession with painting has felt something of a curse. “It’s not an easy occupation, so sometimes I’ve thought why, why, why do I always feel this need to create something?” She laughs. “Can’t I just be a doctor? Why the struggle?”
The upside of her constant urge to create is that she is never bored. “I have a million things in my head that I want to do, but I just don’t have enough time.”
Since emigrating to Perth from Cape Town in 2007, Vanessa has developed a fascination for kangaroo paws and banksias.
“It doesn’t matter how many times I look at the kangaroo paw or the banksia, I just have this intense desire to draw it or to paint it. I think it’s the amazing form and colours, but mostly the form. I also love the eucalyptus trees, the shape of the leaves and the colours, and the way that they hang.”
The choice of which plants or birds she will incorporate into any particular piece is not a calculated decision. “I see something beautiful and I want to recreate it” she says.
Vanessa provides sound advice to budding botanical artists about how to approach such complex floral forms. “When I paint or draw anything, I don’t look at and see ‘this is a flower that I’m going to draw’, I look at it as shapes and light and dark; as shadows and light. And if you do that and you really look at what you’re seeing – the shadows, the light – you can draw anything.”
“If you practice” she adds.
All artworks are by Vanessa Liebenberg and are reproduced with her permission. You can see more of Vanessa’s art on her website.
I’m sure that you’re all familiar with our State floral emblem, the unique Red-and-Green (or Mangles’) Kangaroo Paw (Anigozanthos manglesii). Quite rightly, it’s a popular addition to native gardens right around Australia and, of course, can be found growing naturally across wide areas of southwestern WA. But there are more ‘kangaroo paws’ than just the familiar Mangles’ and the popular hybrids produced for gardens by the boffins at Kings Park. Did you know that there are actually 11 species (and 13 recognised subs-species) of Kangaroo Paw in the genus Anigozanthos? No? How about the fact that there is one species that has a genus all to itself? Read on if you’d like to learn more about this fascinating group -and who wouldn’t? Continue reading “Paws for Thought”→
The Wildflower Society and the Urban Bushland Council made submissions on a clearing permit from Main Roads in November 2015 for the upgrade and clearing of the whole of the York-Merredin Road; 38.85ha of habitat including 592 trees were to be lost for road widening. A Clearing Permit was granted with an offset, despite the proposal being at variance to five of the clearing principles and potentially at variance to three others. The Wildflower Society and the UBC responded by appealing against the granting of the permit and then they personally met the Appeals Convenor, but the end result was that the proposal was approved. A local York resident only knew about the Main Roads proposal when trees were being cut down last week. He contacted the UBC for help. Margaret Owen from the UBC, Eddy Wajon and a local resident have been in contact with Main Roads in the last few days to have them consider alternative strategies that would save many of the 70 trees in an avenue of magnificent trees just out of York. That story and images of the avenue of trees will be on the ABC news tonight.
If you think you can help by contacting Main Roads or the Shire of York, or the Environment Minister, to push for these alternative strategies to be used to save these trees, please do so. More information at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-01-10/’ancient’-wheatbelt-trees-felled-york-merredin-road-upgrade/8173624 Photos courtesy ABC News and E Wajon.
“Keep calm and smell the flowers” = volunteers from the Murdoch Branch took part this year in the national Garage Sale Trail event, held on 22 October 2016. The aim was to raise funds for the Wildflower Society of Western Australia (Murdoch Branch) and boost the work we do to promote, inform the public and protect our precious bushland. The sale was organized by Branch Committee member Dr Christina Birnbaum with help from Dr Eddy Wajon, Dr Alex George, Pawel Waryszak (Branch President), Ross Young and Ben Sims (Branch Vice-President).
At the talk on the 8th September 2016 meeting of the Armadale Branch , Kevn Griffiths gave a talk on Fungi. Kevn began his talk by informing the group that his interest in fungi started when his daughter Donna, a gifted artist, was asked to do a book on fungi, but she had no time to do so and that he took on the project for her. He knew absolutely nothing about fungi at that time and he soon found himself on a steep learning curve.
Fungi in Australia are virtually unnamed, but Dr Neale Bougher, a Western Australian fungi expert, renamed and reclassified many fungi that had been previously documented here in WA.
There are many different fungi found in a woodland and their main role is composting. A mycorrhiza is a symbiotic relationship between a fungus and the roots of a vascular plant such as a tree. The fungi help the tree by clinging to the roots where they get sugar and the tree gets nutrients far from the base of the tree because of the way that fungi attach and spread from tree roots. Fungi also breakdown leaves to compost and small animals such as Woylies eat fungus and disperse the spores far from the parent fungi.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed lacus et neque consequat euismod at ac odio. Vestibulum viverra urna orci, elementum dignissim sapien interdum vestibulum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed lacus et neque consequat euismod at ac odio. Vestibulum viverra urna orci, elementum dignissim sapien interdum vestibulum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed lacus et neque consequat euismod at ac odio. Vestibulum viverra urna orci, elementum dignissim sapien interdum vestibulum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed lacus et neque consequat euismod at ac odio. Vestibulum viverra urna orci, elementum dignissim sapien interdum vestibulum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed lacus et neque consequat euismod at ac odio. Vestibulum viverra urna orci, elementum dignissim sapien interdum vestibulum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed lacus et neque consequat euismod at ac odio. Vestibulum viverra urna orci, elementum dignissim sapien interdum vestibulum.
The Wildflower Society uses its independent technical knowledge of WA’s wildflowers to help you better know, grow, enjoy and conserve the wildflowers of Western Australia.
We are committed to providing help to the following…
